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Jobless rates fall for Black and Hispanic men in September

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Job seekers attend the JobNewsUSA.com South Florida Job Fair held at the Amerant Bank Arena in Sunrise, Florida, on June 26, 2024.

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The unemployment rate for men in Black and Hispanic racial groups declined in September while staying little-changed for other racial groups, according to data released Friday by the Department of Labor.

In September, Black men saw their jobless rate fall to 5.1% from 5.9% in the month prior. The jobless rate similarly fell for Hispanic men to 4.1% from 4.8% last month.

The overall unemployment rate inched lower to 4.1% in September, down just 0.1 percentage point from August.

“The Black unemployment rate is still 1.5 times that of white workers, but it edged down in September to the lowest level since April,” said Bankrate economic analyst Sarah Foster. “Black unemployment typically holds about two times higher than White unemployment, among the first to be laid off. Meanwhile, the unemployment rate for Hispanic workers hit the lowest since June.”

This marks the first fall in unemployment for Black workers in five months, Foster added.

Meanwhile, the jobless rates for other racial groups remained little changed or fell slightly. Unemployment for Asian workers held steady at 4.1%. For white workers, it inched down to 3.6% from 3.8% in September.

The jobless rate for women across racial groups recorded small declines. Black and Hispanic women both experienced a 0.2% drop in unemployment in September to 5.3% and 4.8%, respectively. Unemployment for white women also ticked lower to 3.1% from 3.4%. The jobless rates for Asian workers separated by gender were not readily available.

The employment-to-population ratio for female prime-age workers, or those ages 25 to 54, fell to its lowest level since May.

“Prime-age labor force participation still remains near a historic high despite ticking down from its recent record-setting high in August,” said Foster.

Last month, the labor force participation rate — the percentage of the population that is either employed or actively seeking work — was unchanged at 62.7%.

Among white workers, the rate inched up just 0.1 percentage point to 62.4%, while it fell to 67.4% from 67.8% for Hispanic workers. Among Asian workers, participation slipped to 65.3% from 65.5%, and rose among Black workers to 62.9% from 62.7%.

— CNBC’s Gabriel Cortes contributed to this report.

Economics

Elon Musk’s failure in government

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WHEN DONALD TRUMP announced last November that Elon Musk would be heading a government-efficiency initiative, many of his fellow magnates were delighted. The idea, wrote Shaun Maguire, a partner at Sequoia Capital, a venture-capital firm, was “one of the greatest things I’ve ever read.” Bill Ackman, a billionaire hedge-fund manager, wrote his own three-step guide to how DOGE, as it became known, could influence government policy. Even Bernie Sanders, a left-wing senator, tweeted hedged support, saying that Mr Musk was “right”, pointing to waste and fraud in the defence budget.

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Economics

The fantastical world of Republican economic thinking

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The elites of the American right cannot reconcile the inconsistencies in their policy platform

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Economics

People cooking at home at highest level since Covid, Campbell’s says

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A worker arranges cans of Campbell’s soup on a supermarket shelf in San Rafael, California.

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Campbell’s has seen customers prepare their own meals at the highest rate in about half a decade, offering the latest sign of everyday people tightening their wallets amid economic concerns.

“Consumers are cooking at home at the highest levels since early 2020,” Campbell’s CEO Mick Beekhuizen said Monday, adding that consumption has increased among all income brackets in the meals and beverages category.

Beekhuizen drew parallels between today and the time when Americans were facing the early stages of what would become a global pandemic. It was a period of broad economic uncertainty as the Covid virus affected every aspect of everyday life and caused massive shakeups in spending and employments trends.

The trends seen by the Pepperidge Farm and V-8 maker comes as Wall Street and economists wonder what’s next for the U.S. economy after President Donald Trump‘s tariff policy raised recession fears and battered consumer sentiment.

More meals at home could mean people are eating out less, showing Americans tightening their belts. That can spell bad news for gross domestic product, two thirds of which relies on consumer spending. A recession is commonly defined as two straight quarters of the GDP shrinking.

It can also underscore the souring outlook of everyday Americans on the national economy. The University of Michigan’s consumer sentiment index last month fell to one of its lowest levels on record.

Campbell’s remarks came after the soup maker beat Wall Street expectations in its fiscal third quarter. The Goldfish and Rao’s parent earned 73 cents per share, excluding one-time items, on $2.48 billion in revenue, while analysts polled by FactSet anticipated 65 cents and $2.43 billion, respectively.

Shares added 0.8% before the bell on Monday. The stock has tumbled more than 18% in 2025.

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